My thoughts* on ACIM Urtext Lesson 169, for June 17, 2024. By grace I live. By grace I am released.
By grace I live. By grace I am released.
* It is the beginning of the witness that God IS.
1. Grace is an aspect of the Love of God which is most like the state prevailing in the unity of truth.
²It is the world’s most lofty aspiration, for it leads beyond the world entirely.
* Remember “the world” as Jesus uses the term is that which excludes God.
³It is past learning, yet the goal of learning, for grace cannot come until the mind prepares itself for true acceptance.
⁴Grace becomes inevitable instantly in those who have prepared a table where it can be gently laid and willingly received; an altar clean and holy for the gift.
2. Grace is acceptance of the Love of God within a world of seeming hate and fear.
* It is my desire that everyone receive the Grace of God and that I be a witness of it.
²By grace alone the hate and fear are gone, for grace presents a state so opposite to everything the world contains, that those whose minds are lighted by the gift of grace can not believe the world of fear is real.
* “The world of fear” cannot be real.
* That does not mean that I do not want to do what I can to show those that believe in fear that it is not real.
3. Grace is not learned.
²The final step must go beyond all learning.
³Grace is not the goal this course aspires to attain.
⁴Yet we prepare for grace in that an open mind can hear the Call to waken.
⁵It is not shut tight against God’s Voice.
⁶It has become aware that there are things it does not know, and thus is ready to accept a state completely different from experience with which it is familiarly at home.
4. We have perhaps appeared to contradict our statement that the revelation of the Father and the Son as one has been already set.
²But we have also said the mind determines when that time will be, and has determined it.
³And yet we urge you to bear witness to the Word of God to hasten the experience of truth, and speed its advent into every mind that recognizes truth’s effects on you.
5. Oneness is simply the idea God is.
* My Goodness! How people like to give me crap because I say this and hold it as my backup to existence and theirs.
²And in His Being, He encompasses all things.
³No mind holds anything but Him.
* This statement supports the concept of the many within One Whole. In fact, God is the Whole that we speak of, is He not?
⁴We say “God is,” and then we cease to speak, for in that knowledge words are meaningless.
* This is where people want to shut the mouths of those who would mention God and THAT was NOT the intention of these words.
* The identification of God and His existence is to be celebrated and foremost in the minds of the Sonship of Christ, not to be set aside like something that is so “divine” it has no place in conversation or recognition! God is in All That Is and not to be ignored or treated like an outcast or plague! He IS the eyes through which we want to see all things for without Him there would be NO EXISTENCE at all. This message is written throughout the Course and the Bible and other teachings of Jesus and it is shunned and mocked by being set on a pedestal so high that am relationship WITH the Son is simply NOT ALLOWED.
* THAT is PRIESTCRAFT. To set the Son up before the Father that the Father is denied existence within the mind of the Son and instead of “speaking for God” as the priesthood would do, the Son is set up and the CRIMINALLY INSANE ego=god mentality is given a persona as an idol that does not have any validity or truth in it, at all. We do the same thing to mothers and fathers in the flesh and use them like parasites to feed off of or to abuse and complain about our very existence that WE have made horrible by denying our unity and oneness and connection to All That Is.
⁵There are no lips to speak them, and no part of mind sufficiently distinct to feel that it is now aware of something not itself.
⁶It has united with its Source.
⁷And like its Source Itself, it merely is.
6. We cannot speak nor write nor even think of this at all.
* Do you hear those words?
* Are you going to tell me that Jesus said not to speak of God?
* THIS is where false intructors have corrupted the truth that was given in the Course.
²It comes to every mind when total recognition that its will is God’s has been completely given and received completely.
* It is received the moment that you are willing to receive it and not something that is held out like a carrot before a donkey that will never be obtained.
³It returns the mind into the endless present, where the past and future cannot be conceived.
* I have often lived in this space in my lifetime. I did not allow my past to rule me and I gave the future over to God. There is no reality that is NOT God to me anymore.
* I notice that those who live in the past and in the future want to visit them and pick at them or add coats of paint that make it the way that suits the emotions that they want to tie into it. THOSE emotions, planted by the CRIMINALLY INSANE ego=god mentality, support an addiction that numbs the creativity and grace of God that this lesson speaks of.
⁴It lies beyond salvation; past all thought of time, forgiveness and the holy face of Christ.
⁵The Son of God has merely disappeared into his Father, as his Father has in him.
⁶The world has never been at all.
⁷Eternity remains a constant state.
* It is so sad that I have to be made embarrassed or ashamed because I want to speak of God and His Son and the REALITY of the Love that they have between them.
7. This is beyond experience we try to hasten.
²Yet forgiveness, taught and learned, brings with it the experiences which bear witness that the time the mind itself determined to abandon all but this is now at hand.
* Grace has existence in the flesh! This is NOT an illusive, hocus pocus proposition that happens in Neverland. These concepts that Jesus is teaching came through minds that were NOT willing to receive the message of the Son’s Innocence and of God’s Love. I am sorry if that offends anyone but it is the truth!
³We do not hasten it (*meaning we do not bring forgiveness), in that what you will offer was concealed from Him Who teaches what forgiveness means.
* This makes NO SENSE! UNLESS you understand that forgiveness had never really been needed because of God’s Existence in the first place which for the duration of the dream state the Son of God denied.
8. All learning was already in His Mind (*the Son of God’s that extends throughout All That Is), accomplished and complete.
²He (*Is God though the Holy Spirit) recognized all that time holds, and gave it to all minds that each one might determine, from a point where time was ended, when it is released to revelation and eternity.
* Can you Hear the beautiful gift offered here?
* Revelation (knowledge IN the moment, Holy Instant by Holy Instant) and ETERNITY are yours RIGHT NOW for the taking.
³We have repeated several times before that you but make a journey that is done.
* AND YOU ARE NOT GOING TO DISAPPEAR INTO A PUFF OF SMOKE!!!
9. For oneness must be here.
²Whatever time the mind has set for revelation is entirely irrelevant to what must be a constant state, forever as it always was; forever to remain as it is now.
* I live there. So can you.
³We merely take the part assigned long since, and fully recognized as perfectly fulfilled by Him Who wrote salvation’s script in His Creator’s Name, and in the Name of His Creator’s Son.
10. There is no need to further clarify what no one in the world can understand.
* OH MY! PLEASE, do NOT read that as if no one here on earth can understand this. It means that those who refuse to acknowledge God will not understand.
²When revelation of your oneness comes, it will be known and fully understood.
* HMM. Yes, and no. Because we are going to remain in the flesh to live in the faith of what we KNOW to be true that we do not see. That is a calling we all have because we are bringing light to others.
³Now we have work to do, for those in time can speak of things beyond, and listen to words which explain what is to come is past already.
* There, do you hear the calling? The opportunity that we have here and now?
⁴Yet what meaning can the words convey to those who count the hours still, and rise and work and go to sleep by them?
* Actually, it should read, “Yet what meaning can the words convey to those who choose to leave God on a shelf and march to the tune of the CRIMINALLY INSANE ego=god?
11. Suffice it, then, that you have work to do to play your part.
* Yes, there is something to do for those students of the Course who get stuck on the phrase “You need do nothing.” And take it out of the context for which it was meant.
* It only meant what this lesson has said which is that our truth is still there untouched by our confusion and refusal to see God’s Love and Presence.
²The ending must remain obscure to you until your part is done.
* Your part is partaking of the Atonement.
³It does not matter.
⁴For your part is still what all the rest depends on.
⁵As you take the role assigned to you, salvation comes a little nearer each uncertain heart that does not beat as yet in tune with God.
* You will be blessed with the strength to carry this out. I have experienced it.
12. Forgiveness is the central theme that runs throughout salvation, holding all its parts in meaningful relationships, the course it runs directed and its outcome sure.
²And now we ask for grace, the final gift salvation can bestow.
³Experience that grace provides will end in time, for grace foreshadows Heaven, yet does not replace the thought of time but for a little while.
* Here again it is easy to assume that all form of experience will be gone when is realized and that is hardly the meaning here. Your are in grace. Your acknowledgment puts you willing to accept your Presence in God which is where Heaven is acknowledged.
* “…yet does not replace the thought of time but for a little while.” The “but” in the middle means that time will become something that you do not worry about or are trapped by as is the state we are in when God is not a part of our identity.
13. The interval suffices.
²It is here that miracles are laid; to be returned by you from holy instants you receive, through grace in your experience, to all who see the light that lingers in your face.
* This is where you see God in All That Is and give thanks for that witness and understanding.
³What is the face of Christ but his who went a moment into timelessness, and brought a clear reflection of the unity he felt an instant back to bless the world?
* In other words, one who saw God as the Father and recognized the Son.
⁴How could you finally attain to it forever, while a part of you remains outside, unknowing, unawakened, and in need of you as witness to the truth?
* YOU happen to be a part of me, and I care about your well being, as much as I care about mine.
14. Be grateful to return, as you were glad to go an instant, and accept the gifts that grace provided you.
* This is worth looking at.
* For one thing, this is a state that you LIVE in. The state of GRATITUDE. Because the “instant” spoken of here becomes what you know to be your very existence.
* The time it takes for one to hear the concept and be able to ‘tap into it’ experientially will vary according to your role here, your personality, your willingness not to listen to that which would tell you that you are crazy, and God doesn’t have time to waste on you and so forth. But it will come. That is for certain. It begins with a desire or willingness that these things be true and then one grows
in confidence and certainty.
²You carry them back to yourself.
³And revelation stands not far behind.
* Revelation is the knowledge or experience that I was referring to.
⁴Its coming is ensured.
⁵We ask for grace, and for experience that comes from grace.
⁶We welcome the release it offers everyone.
⁷We do not ask for the unaskable.
⁸We do not look beyond what grace can give.
* In other words, we do not insist on possessions or status or any manifestation beyond the witness that God IS. It is simply an acknowledgment within.
⁹For this we can give in the grace that has been given us.
15. Our learning goal today does not exceed this prayer.
²Yet in the world, what could be more than what we ask this day of Him Who gives the grace we ask, as it was given Him?
* Grace is the witness from the Holy Spirit and God, Himself that God IS. Thereby I see the Son of God and have witness of my own existence, innocence, and worthiness.
³By grace I live.
⁴By grace I am released.
⁵By grace I give.
⁶By grace I will release.
(ACIM, W-169.1:1–15:6)
* Free stock photo: That little boy knows he is allowed to live. Believe it or not that is the grace that understands God Is. Will he allow the ego mentality to manifest something contrary to that? Do we have any influence on IF that happens or not? These are questions that I suggest that this lesson answers.
Till next time, God bless, debi.
